Twitch’s Art category hits record viewership thanks to ‘artistic nudity’ rule change

Twitch’s Art category hit a record level of viewership after the platform updated its terms of service to allow for “Artistic Nudity” – before quickly reverting the change.

On December 8, streamer, cosplayer, and OnlyFans model ‘Morgpie’ went viral across social media for appearing to stream while topless, subsequently kicking off a new ‘topless meta’ after it began gaining popularity on Twitch.

Quickly, the Amazon-owned platform shut down the new meta, banning ‘AsianBunny’ who first started it, and also Morgpie who popularized the trend.

After facing backlash, Twitch updated its sexual content guidelines on December 13 to provide more clarity. In this change, they permitted “artistic nudity” on the platform as long as the streamer correctly labels the content.

Twitch category has massive spike for ‘artistic nudity’

Following the rule change, the Art category saw a massive spike in popularity. Typically a fairly low-viewership section with more niche content, it became a sensation overnight.

The number of streamers broadcasting under the section increased by over 3,000, while the average number of viewers watching the category also grew by over 3,700, all while it became filled with sexual anime and furry content.

Not only that, the category peaked at just below 100k concurrent viewers, the highest it had seen since August 2021 according to stat tracker SullyGnome.

The update caused quite a lot of mayhem. As the Art category became flooded with sexual content, it wasn’t before long that Twitch quickly rolled back the artistic nudity changes.

In a statement apologizing to the Twitch community, platform CEO Dan Clancy explained they went too far with this change originally.

After much reflection, going forward “depictions of real or fictional nudity won’t be allowed on Twitch, regardless of the medium.” However, sexually suggestive content that appears within video games will still be allowed within reason.